Sailor Jerry Debuts New Ad Campaign: “Life Outside The Lines”

Featuring a cast of non-actors, clips from biker films and help from Iggy Pop

New York, NY (July 7, 2014) – Sailor Jerry, the iconic American clothing brand and spiced rum inspired by
tattoo legend Norman ‘Sailor Jerry’ Collins, has launched a new campaign celebrating the spirit of rebellion through an unofficial lineage of road trips, choppers, wild times and living outside the lines.

Rather than assemble a cast through traditional talent agencies, the Sailor Jerry team reached out to people in bars and motorcycle clubs to find people who lived the spirit espoused by the brand. “We rode out into the California desert, stayed up all night, found empty pools to skate in and filmed it on a Super 8,” explained Creative Director, Justin Pittney. “Then we mixed it up with images inspired by our favorite cult films, found footage and the artwork of Norman Collins. For Sailor Jerry, these things are natural. Creativity and self expression
are part of the brand ethos.”

Before it’s released to the public, the $5 million campaign will be previewed for the brand’s community of 283k Facebook fans and 22k Twitter followers in early July. A US national TV campaign will be aired on 7th of July on high-profile US cable channels. The campaign was created and produced by Quaker City Mercantile. It is supported by digital, print and outdoor advertising as well as social media activity across the brands digital channels.

Sailor Jerry Global Marketing Manager, Bronagh Hunt describes the campaign as, “An expression of the spirit of Norman ‘Sailor Jerry’ Collins, whose legacy has influenced and inspired a generation of freethinkers. We’re proud to encourage people to live life their own way, just as Norman did.”

The 30 and 60 second spots are set to the classic Stooges’ song, ‘TV Eye’, from their 1970 album, Fun House, and features footage from the legendary performance of the song at the Cincinnati Pop Festival dubbed by Rolling Stone magazine as “the great peanut butter incident” (during which Dead Boys frontman Stiv Bators handed Iggy Pop a jar of peanut butter, which he proceeded to smear all over himself).

“I really like the Sailor Jerry spot with The Stooges music from T.V. Eye in it. The edit and the upfront really capture the purity and ferocity with which we played when we were at our best. Scott [Asheton] would have loved to have seen all the young people freaking out, pogo-ing and going nuts to his drum beats. I’m really happy for people to hear and see us in this way. I like the tattoos too. The whole thing is stone Stooge.” – Iggy Pop

Steadily building on its year on year growth, Sailor Jerry Spiced Rum increased its global volume to 931,000 cases in 2013. The brand has won numerous awards including Gold winner of The Rum Masters in 2013 & 2014 from The Spirits Business and has been recognized as one of the fastest growing spirits over the past few years, noted for spurring the global surge in popularity of the Spiced Rum category.

Sailor Jerry is the iconic American brand and spiced rum inspired by the Father of the old-school tattoo, Norman ‘Sailor Jerry’ Collins. It was founded with the intent of keeping his legacy and values of craftsmanship, independence and originality alive.

The company began by producing clothing with the flash artwork of Sailor Jerry and quickly built a cult following. Sailor Jerry Spiced was created based on the old-school tradition of sailors spicing their high-proof rum rations. Sailor Jerry spent half his life as a sailor and the other half tattooing them, so making a spiced rum in his honor was an obvious choice. The rum is made the old-school way – bold and smooth as hell. For more details, log on to the Sailor Jerry website www.sailorjerry.com

About Norman Collins

Collins was born on January 14, 1911 and grew up in Northern California. By trade, he inked his iconic images on the arms of fellow sailors, but he also penned poetry, hosted radio programmes and sailed the high sea with the Navy. It was in his tattoo parlor in Honolulu that he developed his unique style of blending bold American design with Asian colourings and details and invented purple tattoo ink, revolutionizing the tattoo industry and making him one of the most important tattooists of the 20th century. He died on June 12, 1973 and Sailor Jerry celebrates the anniversary of his death each year.

About William Grant & Sons

William Grant & Sons is an independent family-owned distiller founded by William Grant in 1886 and today still controlled by the fifth generation of his family. The Company distils some of the world’s leading brands of Scotch whisky, including the world’s favorite and most awarded single malt Glenfiddich®, the handcrafted range of The Balvenie® single malts and one of the world’s best loved blended Scotches, Grant’s®, as well as selected other spirits, including Hendrick’s® Gin, Sailor Jerry® Spiced Rum and, most recently, Tullamore D.E.W. Irish Whiskey. Click on www.williamgrant.com for more information on the company and its brands.